European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - March 21, 1992, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Neanderthal tool Mou Sterian Point artefacts of our forebears neanderthals Stone tools remained unchanged for thousands of years like typical Point above. Tools of Early moderns in Europe were More specialized like those below from Southwest France and nearby areas in Spain contributing to theory that More advanced moderns soon bested neanderthals in Competition for resources. This theory holds that Early moderns were Able to dominate critical advantages of valleys a water shelter edible plants and game a and eventually to expel neanderthals from these hospitable territories to harsher High altitudes with fewer supplies. However some Early modern skeletons have some neanderthal features lending support to a rival theory that neanderthals were ancestors of present Day Peoples neanderthal 200.000 to 35,000 years ago a it a Early modern tools above Point made from Bone with split base. Bottom Row left to right Stone scraper Point shaped like Willow Leaf Needle made from Bone shouldered Point. By William k. Stevens the new York times Ever since neanderthals were discovered nearly a Century and a half ago they have been seen As something less than fully human. Their Bones suggest that they were Beetle bowed squat thick boned heavily muscled and incredibly Strong with Short forearms and Shin Bones a face pulled so far Forward that the Chin disappears a Side to Side gait and a grip that might break a person s fingers but anthropologists now believe that neanderthals closely approached the earliest modern humans in intellect and level of culture and in some regions May even have equated them. Were neanderthals our ancestors or an evolutionary dead end debate is flaring once More Over the relationship Between modern humans and neanderthals in the period Between 200,000 and 35,000 years ago when the neanderthals lived. One school of thought led by or. Christopher b. Stringer of the natural history museum in London holds that neanderthals were driven to extinction and replaced by Modem humans who originated in Africa about 200,000 years ago. Another school led by or. Milford Wolpoff of the University of Michigan argues that modern humans evolved from neanderthals in Europe and from other archaic species of Homo Sapiens in other parts of he old world. Everyone agrees that the earliest ancestors of both neanderthals and modern humans appeared in Africa at least 5 million years ago. Eventually they evolved into a pre human creature called Homo rectus which migrated out of Africa into the rest of the old world. Separate populations of Homo rectus then evolved in different places into the various archaic versions of Homo Sapiens including the neanderthals of Europe. The argument Over neanderthals relationship to modern humans is about what happened after that. In Stringer s View anatomically modern humans evolved from an archaic form of Homo Sapiens in Africa and then about 100,000 years ago swept out of Africa to human ancestors or evolutionary dead end ? v i a colonize Europe Asta and eventually the rest of the world there was Little or no interbreeding Between the moderns and archaic forms of Homo Sapiens like the neanderthals in his View. But the takeover by the modern humans was pm ably not a Conquest or genocide. Quot there was no  said Stringer. Quot it would have been an economic Competition Quot for food and other resources Quot one in which the neanderthals gradually lost  the replacement took thousands of years he says because the neanderthals and moderns were so closely matched intellectually and culturally otherwise it would have happened much More rapidly. Wolpoff on the other hand says neanderthals were ancestors of modern europeans although the evolving europeans of that Era May have interbred with their counterparts in other regions. Wolpoff and those who support him cite archaeological evidence from Central Europe that they say shows that the earliest modern humans there had some clearly neanderthal features. Furthermore says the Wolpoff school the evolution of modern humans was More complicated than Stringer would have it taking different paths and twists in different parts of the old world. In Israel they say where neanderthals overlapped with Early moderns for about 50,000 years the two populations were intellectual and cultural equals. Quot their behaviour was the same Quot said Wolpoff. Quot if you saw this any other time you d say these were two races in Contact Quot rather than separate species. Scientists have been arguing about neanderthals since r i Ltd us Gay y to i a Rig a it a a sources Christopher Stringer the human revolution Princeton University. National geographic the human career University of Chicago it approximate distribution of Toto Noan Ortbals Africa i Middle East the discovery of a partial Skull in a Cave in the Neander Valley of Germany in 1856. The latest phase of the debate began in the mid-1980s, when genetic analysis suggested that modern humans first appeared in Africa and then spread out from there. The genetic findings were based on an analysis of Dan contained in the mitochondria tiny structures that generate Energy for body cells and which Are inherited via the ovum Only through the female line. Using this technique to draw up a family tree of modern human populations scientists at the University of California at Berkeley calculated that the earliest modern humans emerged from Africa about 200,000 years ago. Stringer and others who believe neanderthals were an evolutionary dead end say that the modern humans spread from Africa into the near East and thence to the rest of the world. The remains of Early modern humans found in both Africa and Israel about 100,000 years old Are Quot what i consider to be genuine modern humans a Stringer said. Quot if you look for modern humans in other parts of the world there is no evidence until 40.000 years ago or less Quot last june French scientists reported that a neanderthal Skeleton discovered near the Village of Saint Cesaire North of Bordeaux was about 36,000 years old. Stringer interprets this to mean that modern humans a and neanderthals must have coexisted in Europe for thousands of years. If there was any interbreeding Between moderns and european neanderthals he says it was insignificant. Quot the neanderthal contribution to the evolution of Modem people is negligible Quot he said. Stringer says modern humans did not supplant neanderthals by conquering or killing them just that they had an Edge in technological or demographic Competition even though the tools found at Saint Cesaire suggest that later neanderthals were almost As accomplished As moderns. Quot i believe the neanderthals did lose out because they were inferior but i Don t see them As being massively inferior Quot said Stringer. Quot otherwise they would have lost out much sooner Quot Ezra Zubrow. An anthropologist at the state University of new York at Buffalo has calculated that a Rise of even 2 percent in the mortality rate of neanderthals caused by disease perhaps or Lack of food could have led to their extinction in Only 1,000 years or 30 generations. The shape of the neanderthals upper respiratory tract which evolved to Aid nasal breathing in a cold dry climate May have predisposed them to serious respiratory infections putting them at further disadvantage says or. Jeffrey to Laitman an anthropologist at mount Sinai school of Medicine in new York. The neanderthal Larynx was higher than that of modern humans Laitman believes limiting the neanderthals ability to speak. Stringer has written that neanderthals were gradually displaced to environments where food supplies were less reliable and Quot where their dwindling numbers would have suffered greater attrition from the vagaries of fluctuating climates and food supplies As Well As disease Quot adding Quot the neanderthals probably went out with a whimper not a bang Quot Wolpoff and his colleagues argue that Stringer s ideas however elegant Are contradicted by the Fossil record. Abundant evidence from Central Europe they say establishes that Early modern humans still displayed Many traits that Are clearly neanderthal in character and therefore evolved from them Nancy sly in Good the new York times. Hlili Iraklion toy Dimitry Schidlo ski Many Early Modem skulls for example. Display a telltale Bone near the place where the Mandibular nerve enters the jaw. The Bone is a Well established characteristic of neanderthal skulls says or. David f Rayer a physical anthropologist at the University of Kansas another Marker seen in both is the space Between the third molar and the jaw in addition says or. Fred h. Smith of the University of Northern Illinois the backs of most neanderthal skulls look Quot As if a Little Bun were stuck  skulls of Early modern humans found in Czechoslovakia also display this feature but it is found in neither the neanderthals nor the Early moderns in Israel Quot How did the earliest modern humans in Eastern Europe get it unless they got it from neanderthals Smith said in the past said Frayer scientists have compared neanderthals with modern skeletons no older than 100 to 300 years concluding that there was a huge anatomical Gap Between neanderthals and All Modem humans Quot we re going to be showing at the Chicago meeting that the Gap in t that great a he said. Neanderthals and Early moderns who coexisted in Israel 50,000 to 100,000 years ago Are said to display an especially striking cultural similarity. Quot their archaeology is so identical its shocking a said Wolpoff. They made the same kinds of tools using the same techniques. They hunted and butchered the same animals in the same Way. They buried their dead in the same manner with the same artefacts. As for the european neanderthals Wolpoff suggests that they followed a separate evolutionary course from those of the near East. They might have differed As for instance a modern swede and a modern iranian differ. And in fact their skeletons while clearly of the neanderthal Type differ in some details from those of their european counterparts. Wolpoff and his allies question the reliability of the mitochondrial Dan studies that bolster Stringer s ideas some critics say that the Dan analysis assumes that evolution takes place in the minimum number of Steps possible but that there is no reason to believe it actually operates so tidily and efficiently. The exodus of modern humans from Africa May have occurred far earlier in their View than the Dan analysis implies. A number of anthropologists believe the truth May lie somewhere Between the two schools of thought. Smith for one believes that although modern europeans evolved in Large measure from neanderthals other Early moderns from elsewhere including Africa probably moved into Europe and interbred with the evolving europeans. Why wore the neanderthals in Europe for so Long Only to fade out Smith proposes what he Calls Quot a possible  neanderthals physical characteristics he suggests enabled them to adapt Well to the cold of ice age Europe. The most recent ice age lasted from about 120,000 to about 18,000 years ago when the ice shoots began a gradual withdrawal. The neanderthals had Large babies and Sie helps babies survive cold better. From an adaptation standpoint the other physical characteristics of neanderthals May Havo been secondary. During a warm interlude in the last ice age Smith s scenario continues Early modern people from ols Ewere lacking the neanderthals physical adaptation to cold drifted into Europe and interbred with its neanderthal population. The ice age reasserted itself for a time but by then the surviving population had developed better clothing More efficient fires and better houses to withstand Tho cold. A robust body adapted to cold became loss important and even a liability because it required More Energy As the generations passed the human population lost its neanderthal features under the Cullis g of natural selection. But White the neanderthal physical Type disappeared Smith says the Breed Quot did not go extinct in the classical  rather lie said neanderthal . Live on Loday in europeans and those who like most americans Trace their lineage to Europe Page 14 the stars and stripes saturday March 21, 1992 the stars and stripes Page 15